


you made an impression

by wastrelwoods



Series: bad things happen bingo [1]
Category: The Penumbra Podcast
Genre: Dissociation, Hurt/Comfort, Talking about your feelings, Threats of Violence, its like. the anti fake married, sundry crime ocs, the setting matters for context a LITTLE but mostly its all abt the Pain, what if. hear me out. they had to pretend to be enemies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-18
Updated: 2019-02-18
Packaged: 2019-10-30 16:26:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,925
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17832056
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wastrelwoods/pseuds/wastrelwoods
Summary: Juno’s stomach churns, and he forces himself to breathe through it, remember who he trusts. There’s a cover to maintain. “Whatever you dish out,” he says, evenly. “I’m sure I can take it.”





	you made an impression

**Author's Note:**

> BIG OL WARNING for intimate partner violence. not part of a pattern of abuse but definitely not a good thing. this is not good things happen bingo

The New Trimurti Grand Hotel seems like a nice place to stay when you’re not in handcuffs. Juno casts his eye over the elegant alabaster decor with a vague malaise of disappointment that he can’t take time to appreciate the visit or the view, and tries to keep in step with his armed escort. 

A life of thrills and decadence, Nureyev had promised. Every day a vacation, touring the universe and never staying still long enough for boredom to catch up with them. He’s kept up his end of the deal pretty well so far. Better track record than Juno has managed in the past year, for sure. But everyone has their off days. 

The guard’s one of those types who gets real handsy with a blaster. The kind of creep Juno saw a lot of, back in the day, just champing at the bit for the moment the commanding officer turned his back and waited politely for a confession to miraculously appear. Juno keeps his head low and grits his teeth while the goon digs the barrel of the weapon into the small of his back like he’s got something to prove. 

As a rule, Juno prefers the jobs where he and Peter stick together on the inside. It isn’t that there’s a higher chance of things going south when they split up, exactly, because the plan always seems to change abruptly three-quarters of the way in anyway, and it isn’t like the problem is trust, because Juno’s put his life in Nureyev’s hands a hundred times before and he’s still alive, isn’t he? He follows through. 

No, Juno knows Nureyev can hold up his end of the deal. Its himself he’s less sure about, most of the time. It doesn’t matter so much when Peter’s there by his side every step of the way, but Peter’s not here now. 

The guard pulls aside a curtain and pushes Juno forward into a dark room that reeks of cigar smoke. Four shadowed figures at a table glance up at him with near-identical frowns. There’s a moment of annoyed ambivalence at the interruption, until the one at the head of the table starts, and pushes back her chair, peering down her nose at Juno like a bird of prey. 

“So you caught our little snoop,” she announces, coldly, and the rest of their faces go chilly, following suit. “Good work, Han, you may go.”

Juno’s escort bows politely and jabs him with the blaster one more time before retreating and letting the curtain fall behind him.

“We met at the gala last night, didn’t we,” another of the figures chimes in, narrowing xir eyes at Juno. Xie’s old money enough to be dressed two centuries behind the times, hair powdered white and diamonds sewn into the lapels of xir tailored jaquard suit. “I remember you. Lane, or something.”

“Kane,” Juno tells xir, teeth still gritted. “Inanna Kane.”

“I’ve no interest in your name,” the woman at the head of the table says. “I want to know who put you up to this little charade.”

Juno’s acting is hardly the stuff of streams, but he’s petulant enough to make up for it with style. “What do you mean?” he says, stupidly.

One of the two men on the other side of the table leans forward, his moustache trembling. “We have the footage of your attempt to wire-tap our offices, Mr. Kane,” he says, and clears his throat. “And you were clearly being instructed on how to do it over a comms.” 

“I was…talking to myself,” Juno fibs. 

“No one goes to the trouble of wire-tapping an office for their own use,” the fourth figure says, in a familiar voice made sharper and softer than Juno is used to hearing it. He’s standing, and staged a little behind the others, almost disappearing into the shadows of the room. “There are much simpler ways to eavesdrop.” His thin lip curls and reveals a sharp tooth. Juno drops his gaze down to the pattern of the carpet. 

“Exactly as Ivan says,” the second agrees. “You’re acting on someone’s orders. Give them up, and we’ll hear no more about it.” 

Juno’s hands twitch against the cuffs binding them, and he tilts his chin up in defiance. “I never got a name,” he lies again. 

“Preposterous,” the bird-woman scoffs, and the third sighs, jowls trembling as he shakes his head. 

“Now listen here, you seem like a bright young lady,” he says, and claps a hand on Juno’s shoulder. One knee buckles under the pressure, and Juno flinches. “I’d hate to see you end up in a bad way over something as trivial as one little name.” 

“Yeah?” Juno says dryly. “And I’m sure that bio-warfare arms deal you’re putting together back here is gonna do a lot of good for a lot of people. Hell, we could all use a little plague these days, right?” 

The grip on his shoulder tightens, and releases abruptly. “I would advise you to mind your manners, Mr. Kane, in front of your betters.”

Juno snorts, but stays quiet. 

“I want him to talk,” the first woman complains, through a mouthful of champagne. “Get Han back in here, he always knows how to make them talk.”

“May I?” the one they call Ivan interjects, softly. The three at the table nod, and he steps out of the shadows, peering at Juno over the frames of his glasses. There’s no warmth in his bright eyes. No hint of recognition. Juno stares back, defiant and silent.

“We’re reasonable people, you know, my associates and I.” he tells Juno, coolly. “We don’t like getting our hands dirty. But I will protect my interests, Mr. Kane. _Inanna_. And until we know how far the private information you stole from this fine hotel has spread, I can’t guarantee our hands will remain unbloodied for long.” He peels off his gloves, slowly, and drops them to the table. 

Juno’s stomach churns, and he forces himself to breathe through it, remember who he trusts. There’s a cover to maintain. “Whatever you dish out,” he says, evenly. “I’m sure I can take it.” 

Nureyev blinks, and presses his lips together in a thin, tense line, and slaps Juno across the face with an open palm. Just hard enough to sting, and make Juno’s throat feel tight. But not hard enough to look really convincing. 

"Who do you work for?" Ivan Ko says, with Peter Nureyev’s voice.

Juno glares. "Put your back into it and maybe I'll tell you."

Come on, he thinks. Make it believable.

Peter hits him again, backhand this time, and hard enough that one of his rings catches at Juno’s lip and tears it open. It’s part of the plan, but knowing that doesn’t make him ready for it. He tastes blood, and swallows another wave of nausea, and shuts his eye. His skin feels hot and too tight and he wants, abruptly, for all of it to be over. 

But it’s too soon. He knows it’s too soon. If he gives in now, it looks too easy. The tycoons who run the Trimurti aren’t smart, but they really aren’t stupid. Juno can’t look Peter in the face like this, his lip split and his eye burning, without giving the game away. It can’t end yet. And if one of them doesn’t stay firmly in the cadre’s good books, they both lose their only safety net, and then, probably, their lives. 

He can feel Peter hesitating, knows that if he waits another moment the game will be up, so he braces himself and takes a deep breath, spits a mouthful of blood all over Ivan Ko’s leather shoes. 

Nureyev swallows, and out of the corner of his eye Juno watches his face shutter back into a cold, calculating mask, before his hand reaches up to grip Juno by the collar and drag him forward. Before he can catch his breath he’s sprawled halfway over the table, spilling drinks and scattering holographic files into shards of light and static. His arms fall in front of him, and Nureyev catches his bound wrists and pins them down, slipping a penknife from his sleeve. 

The assembled crew don’t even blink, bunch of bloodthirsty bastards. Juno hears the one in the powdered wig cough into xir hand and say, conversationally, “Start with the left hand, won’t you, Ivan?” 

Juno’s heart races so hard he can feel it in his ribs, but he forces himself to wait until Peter’s got the point of the knife resting against the first knuckle of his little finger before he grunts out a terrified, “Wait! Shit!” 

Ivan pauses. “Something you want to share, Inanna?”

The cracking, unsteady tenor of his voice comes easily. It’s hard to fake scared, but Juno’s barely faking at all. “It was Kanagawa,” he confesses, “Cecil Kanagawa, or his manager, or whoever runs the place. Said he’d pay a lot of creds for the audio. Said he wanted to document a war drama in real time.” It’s a practiced lie, but with Peter’s knife starting to dig into the joints of his hand Juno hopes he can make a lot of lies sound very true. 

“Kanagawa?” the jowly man repeats. “Is that true?”

“It is, I swear,” Juno says, sweat beading on his forehead and blood dripping off his lip onto the tablecloth. “Fuck.”

The knife hovering over Juno’s hand lifts away, but Nureyev’s hand keeps Juno’s wrists pinned down while the other lifts his face up by the hair. He’s kept just enough of Ivan’s composure that with the focus of the attention off himself, he’s probably safe from suspicion, but it’s a near thing. Juno’s eye flits away from his face as his stomach churns again. “And did Kanagawa get his recording, Mr. Kane?” 

Almost there. Almost done. Just a little more work, and they’ll take the bait. Juno clenches his jaw tight. “I don’t know,” he growls, and braces himself, and Peter brings the knife down, hard, into the table just between two of his fingers, and slaps him one more time. Juno feels the ring cut into his cheek, and shuts his eye as he tries to regain his balance, keep himself from doing something monumentally, dangerously stupid like crying. 

“Try again,” Ivan says, and Juno hopes he’s the only one who can hear the tremor in his voice.

He rests his forehead against the table, and takes a deep breath, and forces out a raw, miserable croak that sounds something like, “Comms. Right jacket pocket.” 

Peter knows where it is. Peter put it there himself, two days ago, while they talked the plan through over plates of cold eggs and tried not to think too hard about how long it would be before they both ended up safe and reunited on the other side. Ivan digs the device out and places it on the table in front of his new friends, who peer down their noses at it. 

“I hope,” he says, “For your sake, Mr. Kane, that you are not holding anything back.” 

Juno can’t force his eye open. His head feels hollow, and his mouth is dry and tastes like copper. He shakes his head, faintly. 

The hands on him loosen, but Juno stays slumped over the table, aching and dizzy and slightly numb. The birdlike woman hums discontentedly. “I still think we ought to get rid of the little rat. He’s a liability.” 

“A liability who’s broken a contract with the Kanagawas, my dear Blanche,” Ivan says. “Why go to the trouble when Cecil will clean all of this up for us anyway?” 

“My doctor was warning me about my high blood pressure, you know,” one of the others agrees. “Suggested I ought to stay away from executions for a few months. For my health.” 

Facedown on the table, Juno decides, abruptly, that he’s had enough of this. He drifts, for a while, and resolves to check back in as soon as the misery abates. At some point in time, he’s moved from the curtained room to a cell, and then, for a while, he’s alone. 

 

 

“Juno,” Peter says, softly, and he looks up, a little of the heavy fog dissipating from his aching head. It’s the kind of late hour that reasonable people probably call early morning, though the suns won’t be up until at least midday here. 

Peter’s hovering in the doorway, keys in his hand. He’s shed the pinstripe suit he was wearing earlier and changed it out for something soft and lacy and altogether more his own. Though Juno could tell by the look on his face alone that the persona of Ivan Ko is long gone. His eyes are softer, now, and lined with worry. 

“Took you long enough,” Juno says, the relief flooding into his voice. He tries to offer Peter a tight smile while he stands, but the bruised half his face protests. “Let’s get out of here, yeah? I’m fucking sick of this place.” 

“Yes, I really don’t think the six-star rating is all that they make it out to be. I wouldn’t recommend the venue. And room service was awful.” Peter reaches out to take his hand, and Juno, damn him, flinches. 

He feels like the world’s biggest idiot with a cherry on top for doing it, wants to shrivel up and fall through the floor directly into the molten core of the planet, prays that it somehow escaped Peter’s notice. 

But nobody up there is taking calls at this hour, or it’s just Juno’s lucky day, because Peter goes still, totally icy still, and drops his hand. “I--” he begins, and bites down hard on his tongue. “We should move quickly, Detective.” 

Juno follows him, bleakly, and grits his teeth so hard it makes his face throb. 

They make it to the RUBY 7 without much trouble, though Peter ushers Juno in the passenger side and sits down so gingerly in the driver’s seat that Juno can tell how badly he wants to be anywhere else. His eyes skirt away from the road to the purpling bruise and the angry red cut high on Juno’s cheek, and dart away again.

When they make it out into the city, Juno clears his throat, and stoops low in his chair. “Quit it,” he grunts. 

Peter’s hands grip the steering wheel so hard his knuckles go white. “What do you mean?” he lies unconvincingly.

“I’m not gonna sit here and watch you wallow in guilt all night, Nureyev, that’s my job. We can’t both throw a pity party at the same time, that’s ridiculous.” 

“I--” Peter stops, glances over at him and back to the road. “I’m not being ridiculous.” 

“Yeah?” Juno says, voice cracking. “So look at me.” 

Peter curses, pulls the car over onto an empty roof, and puts it in park, tersely. He scrubs a hand over his face, fixes his eyes somewhere over Juno’s shoulder, and says. “I hurt you.” 

“I’ve had worse.” 

“That’s not the point,” Peter snaps, eyes finally moving to Juno’s face. “I threatened you, Juno. I hit you. It was shameful.” 

“Yeah,” he says, dully. “I wasn’t a huge fan either, believe me. But it had to happen.” 

“I should have found another way,” Peter seethes, “Should have--”

“I can handle it,” Juno snaps, feels shaky and sick and something boiling over. “Goddamnit, I told you I can handle it, okay? Jesus, Nureyev, you’re not my damn _mother_ \--”

“No,” Peter says, miserably. “No, Juno, I’m not. I won’t--” he clasps his hands together to keep them firmly in his lap. “I won’t do that to you again.” 

A bitter, hollow laugh spills out of Juno’s mouth. “Fuck. That’s what this is all about? My fucking _mom_ smacked me up when I was a kid and now you’re worried that you’re turning out just like her?” 

“That is not what I meant,” Peter argues, his jaw set. He backs down, just a little, enough to make Juno realize his body was setting him up to brace for a punch. “My plan put you in danger. I made you feel unsafe around me. And it was never my intention, but it is _my fault_. And I...regret that. Very much.” 

Juno stares straight ahead and tries to think through half a dozen defense mechanisms all screaming his thoughts back at him. “Listen,” he says. “I don’t have a great track record. With this stuff. Part of me thinks I probably deserve all the pain I can get, so I get that...when I say I don’t blame you, it doesn’t help much.” He glances sidelong at Peter, sees him listening intently. “But I do know that I have people in my corner, people who think I deserve a lot better than that. And I know that if Rita ever thought you were really out to hurt me, she’d probably kill you herself. I trust her judgement. You want to make it up to me that bad, ask her.” 

“Alright.” Peter nods solemnly. “And until then?” 

“Right now?” Juno meets his eyes, and winces. “I’ve got a killer headache and I kinda want you to hold me and tell me everything’s gonna be okay,” he admits. “Also, let’s never do this again.” 

“Agreed,” Peter says, reaching out to brush his fingers over Juno’s jaw, and kissing him gently over his bruised cheek. “I’m sorry,” he says, and kisses his split lip. “For that too.” 

It doesn’t heal the hurt completely, Juno knows. But it helps.

**Author's Note:**

> BAD THINGS HAPPEN BINGO FILL#1: backhand slap 
> 
>  
> 
> the rest of my card is up here on the tumblo! http://wastrelwoods.tumblr.com/post/182791407848  
> i already have a pretty good idea of which ones are my favorites but friend i'll TAKE a suggestion
> 
> the tone for this one is so jarringly different that i would feel bad associating the two but if you want to read about peter slapping juno but much sexier you SHOULD read iimpavid's "lets not and say we did" because its very good and definitely the reason i had face-slapping on the brain in the first place


End file.
